From Weapons to Hope

Before, there was an economic problem in Ivory Coast in 1980, so
the first president of the Ivory Coast - Felix Houphouet Boigny -
tried everything to settle that problem with many politicians,
but they couldn’t. Alassane Ouattara was working for
International Monetary Fund in the United States at that time,
and President Felix Houphouet Boigny called him back to the Ivory
Coast to take care of this problem.That is when President
Houphouet made him prime minister. At that time, all of the
politicians got power without being voted in; they were appointed
by the president.

There were two main ethnic groups in the Ivory Coast: the
Northerners - who were mostly Muslim - and the Southerners - who
were mostly Christian. Alassane Ouattara was political leader,
and other politicians were leaders too. Felix Houphouet Boigny
died on December 7, 1993. Ouattara announced his death to the
nation, saying that "Ivory Coast is orphaned." A brief power
struggle ensued between Alassane Ouattara and Henri Konan Bedie,
the President of the National Assembly, over the presidential
succession in total disregard for the constitution that clearly
gave Henri Konan Bedie the legal right to lead the country if
Houphouet became unfit. To put Ouattara out of political scene,
the president of National Assembly had cursed Ouattara saying
’’Ouattara he is not Ivorian.‘’ Because of Alassane Ouattara,
Northerners were belittled by Southerners, who cursed people from
the northern territories, saying that they are not Ivorian. That
began the story.

The cause of the first civil war was around ethnicity,
nationality and religion. So then, politicians tapped into these
differences to consolidate their monopoly on power, and in the
process, pushed the country toward civil war. The first Ivorian
civil war began in 1999 with little conflict, although most of
the fighting began from 2002 and ended by late 2004.

There was civil war from 2002 to 2004. The country was split in
two, with a rebel-held North and a government-held South. After
the war, we had peace, and we tried to hold an election in 2005.
However, the president at that time - Laurent Gbagbo - kept
refusing to hold an election until 2010. Finally, in 2010,
because of pressure from other countries and the United Nations,
he was obligated to hold an election. During the election, at
first, there were 14 candidates, but in the end, there were two
candidates left: Laurent Gbagbo, and Alassane Ouattara, the
former prime minister of Felix Houphouet.

Since 2005, there were 2 armies in the Ivory Coast. The first
army was from the North (rebel-held), the other army was from the
South (government-held). Before the election, both armies worked
together. There was peace. But when the election happened, after
Laurent Gbagbo lost, there was diplomacy.The United Nations told
him that he lost. All of the organizations from Africa also told
him that he lost. When the Ivory Coast made diplomacy, that did
not get anything. So the population began to think about the
election; they didn’t know who was president because there were 2
presidents. Both of them claimed that they won. In fact, there
were two announcements. The first announcement was by CEI (the
independent electoral commission), which published provisional
results showing that Alassane Ouattara had won the election in
the second round. Then, the President of the Constitutional
Council took to the airwaves to say that the CEI had no authority
left to announce any results because it had already missed its
deadline to announce them and, consequently, the results were
invalid. He announced, instead, that the results were in favor of
Gbagbo. When the population began to think about what had
happened in the election and who they wanted as a leader, one of
Laurent Gbagbo’s political members told the Southerners to kill
or burn Northerners. The southerner army began to kill Northern
people, so the northerner army was dispatched to defend their
Northern brothers, and then a second civil war happened. That
dominated the lives of people in the Ivory Coast.

When you were walking in the street, southern youths and
sometimes the southern army intercepted you and asked for your
identification. From the identification, they could determine if
you were Muslim or Christian. If they determined you were Muslim,
they firstly tried to tell you that you are not Ivorian. Then,
they killed you or burned you. They killed and burned hundreds of
people in the Ivory Coast. When they were trying to do this,
northerners tried to defend themselves.That created a conflict
between a rebel held-northerner and a government-held southerner.

I was 12 years old at that time. Children couldn’t go to school
because of the conflict. Also, they had no freedom. All of those
children! These adults put something in our heart - a feeling.
Like hate. Hate for somebody. I had hate for all of the
southerners (Christian) people because they burned or killed two
of my cousins. At that time, my father was in the U.S. and I was
with my mom and my little brother in Ivory Coast. During those 4
months, I moved from a big city to a little city. I moved because
I didn’t want to die; also, I did not want to see people’s blood.
It was very dangerous in the big city. In the big city, they
killed people I knew, and they also killed and burned a lot of
people because they were northerners (Muslim).

I saw people being killed and burned. It was the first time I saw
somebody die. When I saw people being killed, I felt upset in a
way I can’t describe because that was my first time seeing
someone die. I was scared. I was scared of everything.
Everything. I was with one of my uncles when I first saw somebody
die. My uncle began to cry, shouting, “Great God.” Fortunately, I
was not near him so I was not in danger.

Because of my religion, I forgave the Christians. It was easy to
forgive them because, in my religion, God says, “If somebody
hurts you, no matter what it is they did to you, don’t do this
action again. You have to forgive and forget.” After the war
finished, when we came back to school, we couldn’t speak to our
friends because they were southerners (Christian). Also, our
parents told us, “Do not speak to southern people because they
are our enemy.” I couldn’t talk to southerners. I didn’t hate
southerners, and I like to talk to everybody, so I felt alone. I
felt as if my world was upside down.

Four months later, when the new president, Alassane Ouattara,
took power, he tried to persuade the whole population, “We have
to be together;” in other words, he was promoting peace. So we
didn’t have any choice. If we did not forgive them, there would
be a killing again. Most of the southerners (Christians), they
apologized because they said the northerners (Muslim) took their
power and they killed so many, many people. Right now, everybody
talks about “peace, peace, peace.” We don’t want to see war
anymore. But I don’t think Ivory Coast really has peace yet,
because all of the politicians are not really together. If they
come together, we can have peace.

What I remember most about that time was when the last president
refused to give up power. He lost in front of everybody but he
refused. I saw this on TV. When I first heard that, I thought,
“This president is out of his mind.” I also thought that he
didn’t think about the country’s future. I felt the evil that
could happen if the presidency was left vacant. If the last
president stepped down from power, and then another candidate
took his place, and another after him, there would be democracy
and stability for the country. If that could happen, I would feel
proud for all of Africa. Because in Africa, there are presidents
who spend 10 or 20 years in power. But if there is a new
president, he can change something. If there is a new president,
there is hope for the country.

I just want to say, we just have to be together, and leave the
politicians to do their work, because we are not politicians. In
the future, I want to do something. Firstly, I dream to be a
politician in my country. Maybe in the future, I will decide
more. As a politician, I want to talk about development and
economic problems. I want to go to college here in the U.S. and
then go back to my country for a job because if I study in the
U.S., people would prefer to hire me over someone with the same
educational level from my country.

I wrote this story for many reasons. Firstly, I don’t want to see
killing, burning, discrimination anymore. I don’t want to hear
about these horrible things that happen in Africa anymore. And
then, I want to change the way the politicians govern us, because
I realize they don’t really care about their country - they only
care about themselves. I did not write this to explain what
happened in Ivory Coast, but to say that we didn’t need to adopt
those violent actions. According to one of my friends,
‘’Everything we do to others comes back to us.’’ Then, that means
if we promote peace today, we are going to have peace in the
future. But if we promote trouble, we are going to meet
suffering. We have to promote peace. Finally, I believe it is
important for children to get an education because if we get
educated we can have a brilliant future, free from violence. I
love you Ivory Coast, I love you, Africa.

Tweets from our network

Find us on Facebook

Voices of Youth (VOY) was founded in 1995 as UNICEF’s online place for young people to learn more about issues affecting their world. VOY was recently redesigned for a more modern youth audience and is now the go-to place where you can know more, learn more and do more about our world! You can share your thoughts and opinions with thousands of people from all over the world. You can also discuss social issues such as Education, Environment or Violence and Conflict and inform yourself about HIV/AIDS, Health or Human Rights.